Susan Sackett, center, who was personal executive assistant to Trek franchise creator Gene Roddenberry, recently spoke to the Greater Worcester Humanists group.
Posted on 06/30/2010 9:05:26 AM PDT by iowamark
If you're a big fan of the Star Trek science fiction genre, then there's a good chance that you're a humanist at heart.
That's the way that Susan Sackett, the longtime personal executive assistant to Trek franchise creator Gene Roddenberry, sees it.
Ms. Sackett, who met recently with the Greater Worcester Humanists group at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Worcester, said Mr. Roddenberry was an admitted humanist who liberally sprinkled his out of this world stories about Capt. James Tiberius Kirk, Mr. Spock and the other Star Trek characters with the fundamentals of humanism — a non-theistic, or secular, approach, philosophy, or ideology.
Star Trek has been woven into the cultural fabric since the original television series aired on NBC TV in the mid-1960s. Many sociologists have viewed many of its episodes as morality plays set against the backdrop of space.
The genre has been incorporated into many college studies programs.
Ms. Sackett said that Star Trek, like humanism, promoted ethics, social justice and reason, and rejected religious dogma and the supernatural.
“A lot of science fiction is filled with humanism,” said Ms. Sackett. “You usually don't run across an archbishop of Alpha Centauri.”
She said Mr. Roddenberry, who lectured in Worcester in the 1990s, strived in his Star Trek ventures to affirm the dignity of all people.
“Rationality was the key. … There was no recourse to the supernatural,” she said.
Ms. Sackett said Roddenberry was so resolute about religion that he refused suggestions to add a chaplain to the crew of the starship Enterprise.
She said Star Trek was imbued with what she called the “IDIC Philosophy,” namely, infinite diversity in infinite combination.
Ms. Sackett, with the aid of film clips, said that “The Return of the Archons,” from the original series, was a good example of how Mr. Roddenberry employed elements of humanism in his works.
In that episode, a planet's population follows, in a zombie-like manner, a mysterious cult-like leader, who allows no divergent viewpoints.
The society absorbs individuals into its collective body and the world is free of hate, conflict and crime but creativity, freedom and individualism are stifled.
Ms. Sackett said that “Archons,” like other Star Trek storylines, warns how people can be controlled by religion. In the end, the viewer discovers the cult leader is actually a computer.
Ms. Sackett said that Mr. Roddenberry, a voracious reader, was upset because many rabid fans began to view Star Trek as a religion and its central characters as saints.
She added that, after Mr. Roddenberry's death, some of the Star Trek vehicles, particularly the television spin-off series “Deep Space Nine,” were permeated with religious themes, something the franchise creator would not have appreciated.
Ms. Sackett also noted that the Star Trek series' principled “prime directive,” that humans should not influence or interfere with other races and peoples, was actually a snipe at American involvement in Vietnam, something that television network censors never picked up on.
Ms. Sackett, in a tidbit offered to “trekkies” or “trekkers” in the audience, said Mr. Roddenberry saw himself more as Capt. Picard, the cool-headed commander in the “Next Generation” series, and noted that the Kirk character was modeled on Horatio Hornblower, the protagonist of the C.S. Forester novel series.
In summing up, she said both humanism and Star Trek espouse a rational philosophy that champions compassion and creativity
The two, she said, advocate open societies and participatory democracy.
Ms. Sackett, who was raised in Connecticut, began her association with Mr. Roddenberry in 1974, serving as his assistant until his death in 1991.
She also served as a production assistant on the first Star Trek movie, “Star Trek: The Motion Picture,” and worked closely with Mr. Roddenberry on the next five films.
Ms. Sackett, who is a member of the American Humanist Association board, also was involved with the first five seasons of “Star Trek: The Next Generation,” writing two of that series' episodes, “Menage a Troi” and “The Game.”
She is the author of several books, three of them about Star Trek.
I didn’t bother reading the whole thing. What’s the name of the book she’s flogging? /s
I remember the original Star Trek also dealt with Fascism. There was an episode where a friend of Kirk went down to a planet and tried to use the so called “good aspects of the Third Reich” to a primitive planet only to find that it went the same ways as Hitler’s Germany.
Nah. I just thought Spock was cool.
Ms. Sackett said Roddenberry was so resolute about religion that he refused suggestions to add a chaplain to the crew of the starship Enterprise.She said Star Trek was imbued with what she called the “IDIC Philosophy,” namely, infinite diversity in infinite combination.
Ms. Sackett, with the aid of film clips, said that “The Return of the Archons,” from the original series, was a good example of how Mr. Roddenberry employed elements of humanism in his works.
In that episode, a planet's population follows, in a zombie-like manner, a mysterious cult-like leader, who allows no divergent viewpoints.
Hypocrite.
So it was an indictment of international Communists and the Weather Underground, Jane Fonda, et al imposing Communism on the South Vietnamese?!!!
Apparently she didn't watch the show. OR she thinks that a guy with a super-mind who can mind-control other people, and a race of people who can put people into dream-states where they live their lives, are not "supernatural".
And she apparently missed Kahn.
It's pretty funny because there weren't really "religious" themes, but it was clear from watching the show that without religion, it really was science FICTION.
My favorite being that for some strange reason, they had pretty much infinite power, and yet everybody was still working hard, but supposedly for "personal fulfilment". So they had restaurants even though nobody needed money -- so did people just come and eat for free, and how did that work?
Once in a while they'd bring somebody from that past to remind them that they weren't really as advanced as they thought.
If Vietnamese aren't humans, can she say what race they ARE?
Yes, one of the many times when they conveniently ignored the prime directive, making her comment about that aspect also humorous in her ignorance.
The Prime Directive was a slap at those who believed that you couldn’t interfere, that you should live an isolationist life.
"Get a Life!"
I always thought they simply used the Doctor to play the role of Chaplain.
bump
The guy was a former teacher of Kirk’s, a university professor who tried to implement Naziism... sounds awfully familiar, don’t it ? The educated elites can make leftism work if only THEY are in charge...
Pretty sad how athesists have hijacked the term “humanist”. The humanism that rose during the Renaissance had a strong Christian flavor to it. Someone like St. Thoman More and Erasmus, both characterized as humanists, would be dismayed the terms is now synonymous with atheism. Roddenberry was not very “rational” when he described the future Federation as having no monetary system and people did not work for a wage. The question I always had is how was Kirk allocated the nice hi-rise apartment overlooking SF Bay or how did Bones buy him those antique glasses and first edition of Tale of Two Cities from Wrath of Khan.
So can we now ban “secular humanism” in schools now as it too is a religion? One that posits all men as “gods” in charge of their own destiny? She certainly presents it as incompatible with any other religious viewpoint.
That was a classic skit.
I knew people like the ones asking the questions in the skit when I was in high school.
They gathered at one of their homes every afternoon to watch Star Trek reruns at 5:00 and they all had these secret Star Trek names they had bestowed on each other.
They knew every freakin' line of every freakin' episode by heart.
Welllll, let's see:
Did the New Testament preach Forgiveness?
Did the New Testament preach Charity?
Did the New Testament preach Tolerance and Diversity (Good Samaritan)?
Did the New Testament preach Truth?
Did the New Testament preach Faith?
Seems to us the New Testament where this Word came down to Earth in human form (as in "humanitarian"), not the Old Testament of Fear, Superstition, Revenge, Wealth, and Authoritarianism, is quite the paragon of Reason.
Apparently Ms Sackett, along with about 80 per cent of the rest of humanity including many clergy, don't have a clue. Gene Roddenberry himself? Who knows?
Johnny Suntrade
The less involved Roddenbury was with a series, the better it performed.
The original trek prospered under gene koon.
the next generation only avoided cancellation after the second season ouster of roddenbury.
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